Product Discovery User Research Experimentation Data-Informed Interaction Design
The Context
The platform's product discovery experience was outdated, inconsistent and underutilised across key shopping journeys. Search, related product recommendations & browse navigation are some key areas that lacked guidance and hierarchy, making it harder for shoppers to confidently discover products and build trolleys.
The challenge was to redesign some key discovery touchpoints into a more intuitive, scalable experience that improved product discovery while supporting both customer needs and commercial goals.
The Process
To identify opportunities across the discovery experience, I combined extensive secondary research and industry benchmarking, which included reviewing Baymard guidelines, analysing competitor patterns, exploring ecom best practices and using AI-assisted research to uncover additional considerations around navigation, search and product discovery.
I also collaborated closely with our UXR team to understand existing customer pain points and identify opportunities across key shopping journeys.
The Product Discovery initiative focused on three key areas of the shopping journey:
Browse Navigation - helping customers explore categories and discover products more effectively
Search Improvements - improving search suggestions and discovery within the search experience, focused around trending products
Product Recommendations - encouraging exploratory shopping through related-item recommendations on product pages
While each initiative focused on different customer behaviours, they shared a common goal: improving product discovery through more intuitive and engaging shopping experiences.
Browse Navigation
Using insights from previous research, I developed five prototype directions exploring different approaches to category discovery, balancing business and user-focused goals. These concepts were usability tested with 12 participants to evaluate how effectively they supported product exploration and engagement.
Following the initial testing phase, two concepts emerged with particularly strong results. After refining both directions, we conducted a second preference test to identify the most effective experience for encouraging exploratory browsing and category engagement.
Following the initial testing, the concepts gained strong internal support after demonstrating improvements in product exploration and category engagement. What began as an exploratory exercise evolved into a wider product initiative, allowing the designs to move into continued refinement and feasibility discussions.
Through multiple design review cycles, I iterated on the concepts using UX best practices, Baymard guidelines, accessibility considerations and ongoing stakeholder feedback. Working closely with Product Managers, engineers, UX leadership, and global retailers, I refined the experience and helped shape a direction that balanced customer needs, business goals and technical feasibility.
Search Improvements
I took ownership of the Search Improvements initiative during the final stages of refinement after it was handed over during a team secondment. While the overall direction had already been established, I was responsible for refining the experience through UX reviews, stakeholder feedback and iterative design exploration.
The objective was to improve product discovery within search by surfacing more relevant and timely suggestions while maintaining familiarity with existing customer behaviours.
Through collaboration with UX leadership and Product stakeholders, we refined the scope to focus on a new Trending section within the search dropdown.
Alongside the UI refinement, I expanded the supporting iconography and documented this within our icon library for wider platform use.
Similar Product Recommendations
The Product Recommendations initiative explored how related item suggestions could encourage product discovery and exploratory shopping behaviours directly within the product page.
I designed and refined several recommendation concepts before progressing them through internal reviews and A/B testing, where I iterated on placement, presentation and content hierarchy to balance product visibility with existing shopping behaviours.
The Outcome
Browse Navigation
The proposal has not yet been implemented, but received strong internal support and generated interest from multiple retailers across the UK and Asia.
While currently app-focused, future discussions are exploring how the experience could scale across web.
Search Improvements
While Trending Searches has not yet been implemented, I produced implementation-ready designs across app and web, including component anatomy, interaction behaviours, accessibility requirements, responsive considerations and supporting edge cases for engineering handoff.
Similar Product Recommendations
This feature was implemented across our UK and South Korean retailers, delivering positive engagement results. We saw:
+3.7% increase in BOP page views per customer (UK)
+2.9% increase in BOP page views per customer (KR)
improved page scroll depth and browsing engagement
no negative impact on conversion, ASP, or cash added
There are also various additional designs around page placement ready for future A/B testing.
